The Friend by Teresa Driscoll
Genre: Psychological Thriller
Read: 27th September 2018
Purchase: Amazon
★★★★ 4.5 stars
As with Teresa Driscoll's previous psychological thriller "I Am Watching You", this book begins on a train. Having loved her first book I was really looking for to THE FRIEND.
We meet Sophie who is hundreds of miles away from home when she receives a call that two boys have been in serious accident - and one of them is her son Ben. Problem is, no one knows which boy is which, and the person who came in with them is even more seriously injured and unable to help. A person who Sophie trusted with her son. Her new friend Emma.
Sophie met Emma Carter over a crashed furniture truck and a bag of parsnips when Emma and her son Theo moved to the quaint little village of Tedbury, Devon. They bonded immediately, and the boys become fast friends. But not everyone takes to Emma. When Sophie's husband Mark meets her, he appears to take an instant dislike to her. Then when her good friend Helen comes to visit it becomes clear she isn't keen on her either.
Why does no one else trust Emma? Are they jealous?
When there is a suspicious death in the village involving one of their friends, many eyes turn to Emma who was the last person see with the victim and his wife. And Sophie mentally kicks herself for putting Emma in that situation.
Then when Sophie and Mark visit Cornwall with Ben, Sophie catches a glimpse of a striking red coat on the cliffs...and a woman who looks like Emma. But it can't be Emma. It's just someone who has a coat just like hers.
Told in alternating chapters of TODAY and BEFORE the story unfolds from multiple POVs but mainly Sophie's and an occasionaly glimpse from Emma. The suspense has you on the edge of your seat in the TODAY chapters as we see Sophie struggling to get any information about Ben, and her need to get to the hospital in record time. The tension builds far more slowly in the BEFORE chapters as the story begins when Emma moves into the village, to where we begin to wonder who Emma really is and why she has moved to Tedbury.
I love books told in "flashback" as pieces of the story unfold bit by bit to become a bigger picture in the present tense. It is clever, suspenseful and even a little scary in part.
THE FRIEND has you questioning just how well you know someone, as well as yourself, propelling you from that first moment all the way to the startling conclusion you won't believe.
Another brilliant psychological thriller from Teresa Driscoll. Highly recommended.
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